Vatican releases pastoral reflection on Christian engagement with social media

Vatican City, May 29, 2023 / 04:30 am

Attention #CatholicTwitter and keyboard warriors: The Vatican has released recommendations for how to better “love your neighbor” on social media.

The 20-page text, “Towards Full Presence: A Pastoral Reflection on Engagement with Social Media,” published on May 29, addresses the challenges Christians face in using social media.

Topics covered in the pastoral reflection include information overload, constant scrolling, not giving others one’s full attention, being an “influencer,” witnessing to Christ, “digital detox,” the need for silence, intentional listening, and building community in a fragmented world.

“One significant cognitive challenge of digital culture is the loss of our ability to think deeply and purposefully,” it warns. “We scan the surface and remain in the shallows, instead of deeply pondering realities.”

The Vatican Dicastery for Communication published the document, which was signed by its lay prefect Paolo Ruffini and its Argentine secretary Monsignor Lucio A. Ruiz, who cite many of Pope Francis’ speeches from past World Communications Days.

The text is “not meant to be precise ‘guidelines’ for pastoral ministry,” the dicastery clarified, but seeks to promote a common reflection on how to foster meaningful and caring relationships on social media.

Robbing our attention

The Vatican’s pastoral reflection posits that social media’s constant demand for people’s attention “is similar to the process through which any temptation enters into the human heart and draws our attention away from the only word that is really meaningful and life-giving, the Word of God.”

“Different websites, applications, and platforms are programmed to prey on our human desire for acknowledgment, and they are constantly fighting for people’s attention. Attention itself has become the most valuable asset and commodity,” it says.

“Instead of focusing on one issue at a time, our continuous partial attention rapidly passes from one topic to the other. In our ‘always on’ condition, we face the temptation to post instantly since we are physiologically hooked on digital stimulation, always wanting more content in endless scrolling and frustrated by any lack of updates.”

The text highlights the need for silence and for schools, families, and communities to carve out times for people to detach from digital devices.

It warns that space for “deliberate listening, attentiveness, and discernment of the truth is becoming rare.”

“Without silence and the space to think slowly, deeply, and purposefully, we risk losing not only cognitive capacities but also the depth of our interactions, both human and divine.”

Social media pitfalls

The document raises red flags about “pitfalls to avoid” with social media, such as aggressive and negative speech shared under the “cloak of pseudonymity.”

“Along the ‘digital highways’ many people are hurt by division and hatred. We cannot ignore it. We cannot be just silent passersby. In order to humanize digital environments, we must not forget those who are ‘left behind.’ We can only see what is going on if we look from the perspective of the wounded man in the parable of the Good Samaritan,” it says.

The text notes how algorithms’ content personalization can reinforce people’s own opinions without exposure to other ideas, which at times can lead to “encouraging extreme behaviors.”